I recently read an amazing article by Alexandra Alter in the Wall Street Journal. Its title is “Your E-Book is Reading You.” In a nutshell, she writes about something that many of us don’t consider when we read an e-book. It used to be that reading was a private act. How the reader read a book was an event far removed from the prying eyes of publishers, retailers, distributors, and even authors. Well, not anymore. E-readers and apps for devices like tablets are recording how we read and generating massive amounts of data that companies are mining for crucial nuggets of information. Think of that e-book you read last week. Did you read it all in one sitting? Did you jump ahead to the juicy stuff? Did you search for key words? Did you read it more than once? Did you highlight any passages or read them over several times? Well, all this was recorded in the bowels of a computer somewhere, and while you are reading this blog it may well be being analyzed by someone who wants to understand reader behavior in order to improve marketing and promotional strategies. Many will feel alarmed at this sort of intrusion, and certainly this is an argument in favor of only reading print books. But this does offer a great opportunity for authors. Think about it. When you log into your author page and you see someone has bought your book, have you ever asked yourself what that person did with your book? Did they read it at all? Did they quit halfway through it? Did they reread certain sections several times? Did they highlight certain passages or search for certain words? All this information could be made available to you along with the software to analyze it. That way you could change your writing to better please your readers. I am constantly amazed by how fast things are moving along in this wild new frontier of e-publishing. I hope these changes will result in a better future, but I am troubled by some of the possible implications. Is Big Brother watching us? ***If you like this blog you can have links to each week's posts delivered to your e-mail address. Please click here.

Big Brother is definitely watching us! I'm often perplexed over the digital imprint I'm leaving on the world, but it appears to be part and parcel of our times. Data-mining is great if one truly knows how to glean needed info, and it would be a learning curve I don't want to tackle at the moment ;) Most days, it just feels like the human equation is being removed from language more and more all the time. Orwell is probably rolling over in his grave.

Thanks for your comment Jeri. I am often concerned too about all the stuff I am putting out there. It is my choice to do so and to be a writer and promote books with few exceptions you can't be a reclusive person. But many people read their e-books with no knowledge that companies are mining their reading habits and I think that is wrong. People should know that this is being done.

Having said that I do admit that I would like to know more about how readers read my books. It may not help me to write or promote better, but I am just curious about it.

I hadn't thought about Big Brother belonging only to the 1%, but that's an interesting thought. Thanks for your comment.

Reply

Irma Walter

8/13/2012 06:26:08 pm

Most probably the subconscious mind and the nervous system has capabilities to read other people much better than we'd be willing to admit. We constantly learn more about others and give away more to others than what enters the conscious mind.
Still, most of us maintain the illusion of free will and individual agency.
Tracked data doesn't impact my life unless there is a person out there who has targeted me for mean reasons. And if there is such a person, they will probably find ways to track me no matter what.
Data collected to improve sales and products isn't my concern. My concern is not to get sucked into consumerism. That's a challenge we had in the 50s and 60s.

I wouldn't have a problem with my ebooks reading me if a) I were adequately informed that this was happening and b) I had the option to turn off the snooping features.

Because this is snooping, in a way, and a violation of one's privacy. (I'm big on privacy. To begin with, privacy is a human right.) If web browsers have ad blockers, cookie & script blockers to guard against possibly malicious tracking, then so should e-reading apps.

Your print book being unable to spy on you is a major strike in favor of print, but if you want to read socially then you should be able to, without fear that your data will be used unethically, and you should be able to decide which of your activities can be tracked. It is this layer of control that is missing right now, I think. It should be a part of the reading experience in the dawning era of ebooks.

Next step - the screen is documenting your facial reaction to what you're reading. Massive room for distorted interpretation and misapplication. Writer in for the money may want to adjust to collective likes and dislikes, though it would be a sad development, ending up in getting computers to write books for the masses.